Posts in category Affiliate Marketing
Print Advertising… The Forgotten Direct Sales Income Generator
Over the years, the Internet has become the primary means of trying to sell products, services, or information for many marketers and businesses. However, as popular as the Internet is, it still may not be the most profitable way to advertise or sell.
In our modern day of high-speed technology, many seem to forget that the tried and true method of direct sales marketing through print advertising can still prove to be the most profitable way to go.
Why is this you say? It’s because basic human nature has not changed, nor have human buying triggers. Having something tangible in hand that can be touched is still trusted more than words or images thrown up on a computer screen. In spite of the Internet’s capability of reaching out to multi-millions of email addresses or viewers in a matter of minutes… a printed circular or flyer in hand still holds more credibility.
Think about it. When you get a printed circular or flyer that you can hold in your hand… you tend to look at it as something real that is produced by a real person whom you can identify with. You don’t generally look at it as some unknown face or entity hiding behind a computer screen trying to scam you.
It seems illogical that so many marketers and businesses are unaware of, or have forgotten this old proven method of advertising and selling. Printed forms of advertising and direct sale pieces have stood the test of time, and have proven itself over and over again against everything that has come and gone.
Here’s something else to think about. Most people go online looking for information, not sales offers. So the chance of them running across your online offer is slim to none. However, when a printed direct sales offer is physically placed in the hands of people, they will put forth the effort to seek out the source of the offer. It doesn’t matter if it’s right up the street from them or online… the printed direct sales piece established a certain form of credibility.
With direct sales, you don’t have to worry about getting traffic to a web site, search engine optimization, black hat, white hat, or any of the other online techniques you see touted. People coming online to your web site after reading your printed direct sales piece are generally looking to buy the product or service offered.
The World Wide Web, or Internet should wisely be used in combination with direct sales as an extension of your advertising and sales efforts… not as your primary medium. More people who are ready to buy will find you through direct sales than they would just surfing the internet to see what’s available amid the billions of web pages.
A printed advertising or direct sales piece is really much easier to produce than a web site… wouldn’t you agree? All it has to do is make people aware of what is available, the cost, and where to get it. If the offer is located in a physical building, then give the address and times of operation. If it is located online, the give the web site addresses. It’s just that simple.
Most internet exclusive advertisers will likely see their sales efforts pay off in a much greater way by combining print advertising and direct sales with their online methods. Once a printed direct sales piece establishes credibility, a web site would only need to highlight benefits and give access to the offer.
Now that you realize the benefits and advantages… do yourself and your business a favor, and make print advertising direct sales an important part of your financial well being.
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Keith Nickel Langevin has been in publishing and printing for over 20 years and can almost always save you time, money and headache with your printing needs. Call TOLL FREE 1-888-850-3777 and ask for Keith for fast friendly service.
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The Life Purpose of Your Headlines
Entrepreneurs and business owners know by intuition, or find out by necessity, that their marketing materials are essential for attracting prospects and converting them into buyers.
This much is clear. What they often don’t realize is that simple changes in a promotion can have a profound impact on results.
And one of the quickest and easiest elements to adjust and test is the headline of the sales letter or brochure or web page. By simply trying different headlines one can elevate their response rates by double, triple or much much more.
Of course, every part of the marketing message is critical – the lead, the body, the theme, the features, the benefits, the emotional appeal, the proof elements, the close. But other than the offer itself, they often stand in line behind the headline in terms of conversion.
The reason is elementary. The headline comes before everything else. Right there, splashed across the top of the first page. It is the initial attention-getter, the first element read. It is the bridge to everything else in your copy. The headline is the appealing copy element that persuades the prospect to read the rest of the marketing material.
It achieves this lofty status because it is what grabs your prospect attention, their eyeballs, so they’ll eventually grab their pen to sign or open their wallets to buy. It’s a sales letter for the sales letter.
It can take the form of a subtle allure, a back slapping howdy do, a shouting alarm, a topical news story, or anything in between. The sole requirement is that it works to grab attention and converts that instantaneous moment in time into further readership.
Devising new or multiple headlines is essentially a research and brainstorming task. To keep on the right track, here are some questions one can ask as ideas are being developed.
Does the headline offer a reward? Is there a benefit described or alluded to? Like, “Cut your pay per click costs in half and still stay in the top five results?” or “How to repair your credit score and save yourself from knee-capping interest costs”
Does it have specifics that add credibility and address skepticism? “Nutrition expert, who trains world-class athletes, can help you lose 20 pounds fast” or “customers say green thumb’s expert lawn care lets them have a greener weed free lawn all year round”
Is there an advocate speaking to their needs and coming to their defense? Do they come across as an ally and not just a salesman? “We warned our readers of the market collapse and helped them keep their gains with our well-timed action alerts”.
Does it garner a emotive response or deep concern that your already has permeating their mind? Are they already agitated to the point that they’re not going to take it anymore and seek a solution? For instance, “Who’s really making the money here, me, or my broker?” Or “If I get one more pimple, I’m gonna tear my face off!”
Does it offer a proposition or transaction that gets your prospect nodding in agreement or excited about the thought of going further? “See results in 30 days or it’s free” or “Once you have that fuller head of hair and a renewed confidence, watch out ladies”.
Does it have an element of intrigue or curiosity that simply compels the prospect to find out more? Like “how to burn disease out of your body by simply using the palm of your hand” or “can you write a letter like this one?”
This is merely a hand full of many possible techniques and examples one can use when creating different types of headlines.
Brainstorming ideas and trying different approaches is vital when creating truly big winners that can grow your business by 756% overnight, help you lose 57 and one-half pounds without breaking a sweat, and attract spell-bound buyers like a desk-drawer magnet gathers up stray paper clips. (Uhhh….more brainstorming needed.)
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Getting Back to the Basics of Marketing
Too many entrepreneurs and small businesses dive right into the thick of operations without following basic marketing principles. In business, as in most things, it pays to occasionally take a step back and evaluate the bigger picture. Drafting a very basic marketing plan can help you focus on the right activities, target the right customers and set the best prices.
The STP Process
STP is an acronym for Segmentation, Targeting and Positioning. It represents the highest level of your marketing plan. Ideally, you should start this process before your product or service is ever brought to market. It can still be a worthwhile exercise for and existing product though.
Segmentation
Segmentation is simply a fancy way of saying that you need to identify your customer. Think of every possible customer. Now, start slicing that population into smaller, more defined segments (thus the name segmentation). It’s best to start big here – for example: split individuals from businesses. Now, go into each segment and divide it further. You could split individuals further by sex, age, socio-economic status, geographic location, interests and hobbies and so on. At this point, try not to pigeon-hole yourself by prematurely selecting segments. Remember, you’re trying to find meaningful groups of potential buyers that will exhibit similar buying behavior.
Your goal is to identify opportunities. Once you feel that you have subdivided the market finely enough, then you need to evaluate those segments. Try to quantify how large those segments are, how reachable they are and how unique they are from one another (i.e. is there considerable overlap from one to the next?).
Targeting
The next step in the process is to look at the segments you’ve created and make some decisions about which segments of the market you are going to go after. One of the first decisions you will have to make is whether to target a “mass” market or instead whether your marketing efforts will be more focused. That is to say, are you going for a larger, less defined segment or a smaller more defined segment. The general trend over the last decade has been to go after more defined segments. The extreme here would be to go after a “niche” market which is just a fancy term for a highly defined, fairly small segment. The reasoning being that there will be less competition for those segments.
The segment you choose will have a profound effect on everything else you do. You need to carefully evaluate the most appropriate route for you business. When deciding between different market segments, you will want to try and identify the competition for that segment, the potential value of the segment (i.e. how large is it, how expensive will it be to reach it with advertising, etc.).
Positioning
You’ve segmented the market and you’ve chosen the segment that you are going to go after. The last part of your marketing plan will help you define how you are going to “position” your product or service to your selected target market. This is where you will invoke another handy acronym called the 4P’s – Product, Price, Promotion, and Place.
Product
You need to focus your product towards your selected target. What do the people/firms in your segment want or need? If you are working with an existing product, you need to make sure it fits your intended target market. If it doesn’t, can it be altered so that it does? It’s critical to match the right product with the right customer.
Price
Pricing your offering is an art. You must consider many factors, such as the stigma different price points carry – for example, being too inexpensive sends a message that your product may be junk. It’s also critical to consider the competition here. It makes little sense to target the same market with a similar product at the same price as your competitors. Entire books have been written on the subject of pricing. The important thing to keep in mind is that you can’t lock yourself into a cost plus profit margin way of thinking. Instead, consider the price independently at first in terms of your competition and the value your offering brings to the customer.
Promotion
This is what most people think of when they hear the word marketing. As you can see though, it takes a fair amount of work before you get to this point. Promotion is simply how you intend to get the message to your customers about your offering. Will you use commercials, magazine advertisements, radio, the internet, mass mailings?
Place
Lastly, you need to think about how you will bring your product to market. This is sometimes referred to as marketing channels. That is to say, will you sell directly to the customer or will you sell to distributors or retailers who will then sell it to customers? Where geographically will you sell your product? Will you sell entirely on-line or in a traditional brick-and-mortar location?
Bringing it all together
You probably already have some or most of your marketing plan in your head. However, following this tried-and-true process can help you formalize your marketing strategy and can help you to identify holes in your business and it sometimes can help you identify opportunities that you might not have thought to exploit.